


Mother Null

by razboinicul_iernii



Series: Tales from Castle Rock [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Assets & Handlers, Brainwashing, Electrocution, Gen, Horror, Human Experimentation, Manipulation, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Self-Harm, Unhappy Ending, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, cosmic horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-30
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2019-10-19 09:26:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17598647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/razboinicul_iernii/pseuds/razboinicul_iernii
Summary: Brock liked to think he knew what he was fighting for. Then a reverend-turned-mad-scientist shows up with his experimental cure for all ills and throws a wrench into everything Brock thought he knew about Hydra, the Winter Soldier, and life itself. He learns the hard way that there are some truths better left unknown.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a cross over with a Stephen King book, "Revival". But there were no tags for that. There are spoilers for that book in this fic but you don't need to be familiar with that book to read this.

Brock Rumlow hadn't exactly been hired for his intellect. Well, maybe that wasn't an entirely fair assessment. He was an adept tactician, a competent leader, and a very successful handler. He didn't think of any of his techniques as unorthodox. But in its own way, not being a complete dumbass was in and of itself, unorthodox, so of course this coveted skill was noticed and here he was: STRIKE team Alpha commander and Handler of the Winter Soldier.

The former position hadn't been particularly difficult for him to attain. It was just the culmination of his life's work, really. He'd been in the military since before he was old enough to drink. He knew an academic career wasn't for him. Sure he could bullshit his way through to a Bachelor's in something or another. But in retrospect, it was hard as hell to picture himself in a suit and tie behind a desk all day, helping to make billions for some old bastard and contributing nothing of value to the world. Even if it would've been the safest route through life, it didn't feel meaningful enough to be worth it. And if he hadn't joined SHIELD and been recruited to its special forces division,, he never would've met the Soldier.

That part actually probably would've been okay.

He wouldn't have thought that, at first. The 'at first' is never the hard, scary part, otherwise there wouldn't be an 'at last'. And the at first went kind of like this:

The Soldier was usually a lone operative. But sometimes he required a team to provide a distraction while he honed in on the high priority target. Brock had served many times on said team, starting at around the age of twenty-four. He'd had to sign all these documents, non-disclosure agreements, shit like that, which he didn't blink an eye at. These assignments were not exactly the kind of thing that would make the UN happy to hear about, but that was kind of the problem with the world, wasn't it? Everybody knew what had to be done to make this world a better place, only they dragged their feet and played politics instead of getting it done. So he didn't care that he couldn't tell his drinking buddies about what he'd done last Thursday or whatever.

Maybe it would've been something to tell them about the guy he worked with who shattered impossible to break records, like sprinting a mile in under three minutes, or sniping a target from two miles out. The guy who didn't flinch at broken bones or gunshot wounds. The guy who showed up once every few years and who Brock never saw for the interim period, ever. The mop of shaggy brown hair wasn't hard to miss in a paramilitary setting, after all.

He drifted in and out of Brock's life, some top secret agent you heard myths about but never believed in. If he had a name, no one had ever given it to any of them. He simply went by 'Soldier', or, if you were particularly chummy with the guy, 'Winter'. But it was hard to be friends with somebody who hardly spoke, and who disappeared from existence after the job was done.

Brock had first suspected something kind of off about the fellow's mental state by the third mission they ran together. It kind of changed the way he saw the Soldier. Less as some stuck up, untouchable operative and more like...well, it wasn't polite to say in modern society, but kind of like the slow kid in class everybody bullied, if he was being totally honest with himself. It was in the way he stared hypnotically at one of the other agent's GameBoy during transit like it was alien technology. The way he coveted literally anything you gave to him that wasn't mission related-from spare buttons out of your trousers to a packet of salt from a fast food bag. The idea of something being his was completely novel, every time.

If somebody said Brock Rumlow was soft on the Soldier, they'd probably be right. But that didn't mean he didn't do his job. Otherwise, he wouldn't have it. HYDRA didn't tolerate malfeasance or half-assed work. Least not from people at his level. So he did like he was taught. When the Soldier wasn't acting right, he got punished. When he did something good, he got a reward. It's just, Brock didn't ignore all the in-between, like previous handlers had. That wasn't explicitly against the rules, but you could tell in the way the Soldier reacted to that kind of attention, attention that wasn't just barking orders or warnings or a curt comment about a job well done, that he wasn't used to it.

Brock wasn't attached, like some people implied. It was just in his nature. You always gave a friendly dog a scratch behind the ear, always gave your niece or nephew some junk food whenever you saw them. This was just a logical extension of that, that was all. It didn't interfere with his work. That's what mattered.

And that's why he'd liked the Rev, 'cause he was kind of the same way with the Soldier. Most the guys who worked with the Soldier, they either ignored him entirely or got in their digs, lashing out purely because they knew they could. It was like watching some harpy screeching at the kid behind the counter at the grocery store over twenty-five cents because it was the only place in their life where they had power over somebody who couldn't say shit about it. Made him roll his eyes, every time.

So the Rev was a breath of fresh air in that way. He was a tech. Most techs fell into the indifferent camp with the Soldier. No real surprise there, since Brock got the idea they saw him more as an object than a living thing. A machine that needed maintenance. And that's what they called it, too, when they put him in that chair, maintenance. It terrified the Soldier but what terrified him more was what happened to him when he went without it. Tough break. Damned if you do and so on and so forth.

The Rev, so called because he used to be a preacher, worked with the guys who ran maintenance. He was kind of a funny guy. You could tell he used to preach 'cause the man could go on when you got yourself cornered in a conversation about that fucking chair. Electricity, cure for all ills, nature's greatest miracle, weird melodramatic rants. Brock was mostly okay with listening to him go on because he was pretty good at blocking out shit he didn't really want to hear. And like he said, the Rev treated the Soldier pretty nice, so that gave him brownie points in Brock's book.

Maybe that should've been a red flag from the start. But you know. Hindsight. Not that Brock exactly wanted to look back on the total shitshow that was the Rev's tenure as a tech at HYDRA.

The first time, it hadn't been the Soldier. It'd been one of Brock's subordinates on STRIKE. Guy named Chris. Been too close to an explosion, but not close enough to kill him. He'd recovered from the shrapnel and burns well enough, but his hearing didn't. He'd been bitching to Brock about how unfair it was, and Brock tried to straddle that line between consoling and resolved. Tough love, maybe people called it. He just figured there was no sense wasting time over things you couldn't change. A half-deaf operative was a liability. Not just to himself, but his whole team, and the entire operation. Fair or not, those were the facts.

Reverend Jacobs must've heard their conversation, because suddenly he was sitting there at the table beside Chris, asking him some details about the nature of his injury.

"You a doctor, too?" Chris asked him flatly, still wallowing in pity about the whole thing.

Jacobs smiled like he understood the attitude perfectly well. "Perhaps not as such. But I like to help where I can."

"Regular Good Samaritan, huh Charlie," Brock said. He didn't mean any offense and Jacobs didn't take any.

"I've been working on a...pet project of my own for many years now," he explained. "You see, I have a theory-"

"You wanna shock me like that brain-dead muppet of ours, you can forget it," Chris said pointedly. "I've seen what electricity does to people. Up close and personal. They don't stay people for long."

The Rev wore his usual understanding smile, the I-know-your-pain kind of look. Brock had seen his personnel files-as a handler, he was consulted for anyone that was a contender for dealing with the Soldier in any way, shape, or form. That's how he knew that, yeah, Jacobs really did know pain. Maybe not the physical kind so much. But suffering? A dead wife and child'll bring that on, yeah. "Did you know that no one fully understands the mysteries of electricity?" he asked Chris.

"So?"

"So that gives it limitless potential, don't you think?" Here he paused before holding out a hand, gesturing slightly back towards the vague direction of the Vault, where the Soldier was currently sleeping one of his long, cold sleeps. "Yes, we know the many ways it can destroy something." He drew his hand back, and now gestured towards Chris. "But I think-with quite a level of confidence-that it can be used to fix things, as well."

"The ole yin and yang," Brock put in.

"A force so magnificent and mysterious, why shouldn't it contain such fascinating dualities?" Jacobs said as if Brock had backed up his point. If he had, he hadn't meant to.

Chris looked a little less dismissive now. His eyes flicked to Brock. Then back to Jacobs. "You really think you can fix my hearing with a shock?"

"I think just that." Jacobs set a hand on Chris's shoulder in a comforting gesture. More of that understanding of his. "I can see why you'd be hesitant, given what you've witnessed in your time here. But my methods are nothing like what we do with the Soldier. I'd even venture to say that it's entirely different. It'd be virtually painless, simple. Over within a few minutes."

"You done this before?" Brock asked because it sure sounded like the guy had some experience. He wasn't so hot on people using his teammates as human guinea pigs. He even had limits when it came to what he'd sign off on for researchers to use the Soldier for, which made him a little unpopular with R&D.

"Here and there," Jacobs said flippantly. "It's harmless enough. No real room for errors, certainly not any dangerous ones. At worse, nothing happens. At best..." He turned to Chris and smiled. "You have perfect hearing again and you're back on the field."

It was a tempting enough offer. Brock wasn't so sure about it. After all, if people could be fixed like that with some minor shocks, wouldn't that have been figured out a long time ago? He didn't say that, though. Chris was starting to look convinced. And what'd he have to lose? If Jacobs was telling the truth that there'd be no further risk of damage, it sounded worth trying. He'd be an idiot to lie about that. He'd lose his job in a second if the higher-ups found out he'd been experimenting on his colleagues and ended up hurting or killing one of them. Brock was at least sure the guy wouldn't want to go down that road.

That's how he found himself in a strip mall that afternoon after work with the two of them. The space they were in was small. Probably used to be a cell phone repair place. There was still a counter that split the room in two, and a door that led to a back room. There wasn't much in the place, definitely no product. Just some junky looking stuff Brock couldn't make heads or tails of. Mechanical stuff. He knew cars, knew guns, knew a decent amount about computers. Didn't know shit about engineering.

"You can take a seat here," Jacobs said as he wheeled a chair away from the counter. It was the only one in the place. "I'd offer you one as well, Rumlow, but...I haven't had this lab for very long. I'm a little unprepared for visitors at all, to be perfectly honest."

"It's fine," Brock said. He hadn't exactly planned to come at first. But two forces were nagging at him to come along-suspicion and curiosity. The latter was pretty obvious. The former, well, he couldn't help but picture Chris sitting there with a metal cap on his head, jittering and drooling as smoke poured out of his ears and his eyes turned to jelly. That wouldn't happen, of course, but if it did, Brock didn't want the perpetrator getting away.

"You don't have enough to do at work?" Chris wondered, looking around the place.

Jacobs gave a short laugh. "Everyone has their hobbies, I suppose." He was busy with some little device that looked kind of like a doorbell. One of the rectangular kinds with a long button, not the round ones. It was wired to what looked like a pair of headphones, only there was some kind of metallic mesh where the speakers would go. "I'm going to put these on you now," he announced.

"And you swear nothing bad'll happen to me?" Chris said, looking Jacobs right in the eye.

"I'm very certain of it," he promised. Brock watched him carefully as he did so. He was nervous about something. But Brock wasn't sure the something he was nervous about was Chris getting a shock he couldn't handle. Maybe he didn't like working with an audience.

"Now," Jacobs said, holding the doorbell thing in his hand. "Once this starts, you may lose time. That is perfectly normal. But you won't feel any pain. Are you ready?"

Chris took a breath and glanced at Brock as if to ask if this had been a good idea or not. Brock didn't have an answer for that. Not until it was over, at least. So he gave a thumbs up, even if he wouldn't be sitting in that seat if it were him. "Okay, go for it Rev." Chris squeezed his eyes shut before he finished speaking.

The Jacobs flipped the switch.

Brock expected screams. Maybe it was force of habit. He was used to that with the Soldier. Screams, clenching jaw, tears, twisted arm rests, the smell of piss, the convulsions that threatened to shake him apart.

Nothing like that happened here. Chris went stiff, yeah, stiff and tense, eyes flying open. But he didn't scream, and he didn't seem to be in pain. His arms flew out to his sides and flapped a little, and Brock tried to hide his grin behind his hand but wasn't sure if he should even bother since Chris didn't seem to be connected to the same reality as him and the Rev right now.

Then it was over and Chris blinked rapidly. Jacobs seemed to lean in, almost like he was expecting something. Chris looked over at him and asked, "You gonna do it or what?"

"It's done," Jacobs said primly, pulling the headphones away.

"Well? Your hearing fixed or not? Don't leave me in suspense," Brock said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"It may take just a minute," Jacobs told him.

That didn't stop Chris from snapping his fingers back and forth, first beside the left ear, then the right. Over and over he did it, and Brock heaved an exasperated sigh. But then Chris's eyes lit up and he said, "I heard that!"

Brock stared because he really did not expect it to work. Not at all. He thought he'd be taking Chris out to a bar to get him through this final pity party when the miracle cure fell through. But now it was the opposite. He was soaring. Giggling like an idiot as he clapped beside his left ear over and over.

"I can hear! I can hear! You're a fucking miracle worker, Rev! I can hear!"

"Are you shitting me?" Brock asked, snapping out of his trance. He took a step towards Chris like he'd be able to spot the lie in his face. Or like maybe his hearing loss had been a joke the whole time.

But the happiness on his face was too genuine. It wasn't the grin of somebody pulling one over on you. "Brock, man, put me back in STRIKE!" he said giddily.

"You've been discharged-"

"Because I couldn't hear! But now I can! Lemme get tested again and they'll see!"

"Yeah and how the hell are you going to explain your recovery?" Brock snapped because suddenly he was wondering that himself. How was it going to look when he told the doctors that he tagged along and watched one co-worker experiment on the other? Even if it worked, it was a big fucking no-no.

Chris's face fell a little. He glanced back at Jacobs. "You can tell em. Hell I bet they'd like it, right? It'd be like, a new advantage. Miracle cures. Nobody could keep us down."

"I have wondered what sort of advances I could make with the resources available to me in the workplace," Jacobs mused. But it felt kind of-

It fell into place for Brock almost right away, but he didn't want to say it out loud. Not with Chris still riding his high. Jacobs had been out for a test subject, maybe since he joined up with HYDRA. Give a wounded soldier your electric cure. Get research funding from the higher ups. Something along those lines. "Yeah," Brock said. "Maybe it could be valuable stuff. But you're both going to get shit for this. You for unlicensed human experimentation and you for agreeing to it." He pointed to Jacobs and Chris in turn.

"Yeah but it worked," Chris argued, almost petulantly.

"And if it hadn't? If it had done the opposite of working and killed you? What kind of attention do you two think that draws to SHIELD? To us?" Brock said. Jacobs was smart enough to know that, was the problem. He just didn't care, apparently. "That's the kind of shit you both better be thinking about tonight because the bosses will wanna hear the answers tomorrow."

Chris huffed an annoyed sigh but didn't have a smart remark, or a good response.

Jacobs swooped in with one. "Sometimes great risks yield great rewards. I'm confident our superiors can be made to understand that. As Chris mentioned, there's so much potential value to be found from my work. Surely they can see something useful in it."

Brock snorted. "Guess you'll find out." He looked at Chris and jerked his head towards the door. "Let's get going." Chris shuffled out and muttered another thanks to the Rev. Brock held the door open for him, but then handed off the keys. "Start it. I'll be there in a minute." Chris went without argument. Brock turned back into the store and let the door fall closed behind him. He wasn't sure how to start. "Don't bullshit me, Rev. Did you know that was going to fix him?"

Jacobs wound the wire of the headphones around his knuckles neatly. "I had every reason to believe so, yes."

"And you knew, without a doubt, he wouldn't get hurt?" Brock demanded.

Again, an affirmative.

"Then what the hell are you doing working for us? Why don't you have your own research grants and universities arguing over you?"

Jacobs shrugged. "My research isn't something others are willing to take seriously until they see it for themselves. And even then, they'll require an endless number of trials before they truly believe its efficacy. I don't have time for that. With HYDRA, there is the potential to tap into resources previously unavailable to me without such bureaucracy. With HYDRA, I see like minds. People willing to realize goals previously believed unachievable." He was getting that tone in his voice. That obsessed, dramatic one when somebody got him going about electricity.

"And you used Chris to help put you on the radar of the people who decide how to allot those resources," Brock said flatly.

"Yes. You say it like I've taken advantage of him but I'd say we've both won out, haven't we? I get the opportunity to further my research. He gets his hearing restored. Potentially returns to his job." He took a step towards Brock, voice lowering slightly. "You saw the joy on his face. But you stand here as if to accuse me of doing something wrong."

Brock let out a breath through his nose, slow and measured. Maybe he'd jumped down the guy's throat for nothing. But still, it wasn't exactly best practices to manipulate somebody the way Jacobs had with Chris. "So why not lay it out straight for him?"

Jacobs shook his head, a sour look on his face. "You said it yourself. Unlicensed human experimentation. If I presented it to him that way and made my own intentions clear, that this was more than some benevolent gesture on my part, what would you two have thought? Would you have let him take up my offer? Or would you have been more suspicious from the start, all because I stood to gain something?"

Brock felt his lips press together before curling up at the edges. There was more to the guy than met the eye, that much was for sure. Because he was right. If he'd known from the start that Jacobs was in it for his own gain, he'd assume the risks to all be downplayed. But when it's out of the goodness of his heart, it's entirely different. "You're a sly son of a bitch, Rev," Brock said. It was both at once a compliment and a warning.

"Only out of necessity," Jacobs answered. Again, fair enough. Maybe they were all that way in HYDRA.

 


	2. Chapter 2

Chris got his position back but with a stern warning and a behavioural probation of sorts. Any wrong moves and he was gone for good. The Rev got the same warnings but nothing on his record. Researchers were a lot more valuable than grunts. Brock still saw him when it came time to rouse the Soldier a month or so later, manning the controls of the chair. The chair that doled out the electricity the guy loved so much.

Brock was waiting patiently at parade rest, a stance he took without thinking anymore. He didn't like watching the chair go to work but he'd be one sorry son of a bitch to subject his charge to it while hiding himself away while it happened. He wasn't sure what about it rubbed him the wrong way. Part of him was pretty sure it was just him being soft. The Soldier got those big sad eyes when he heard a wipe was coming but he always submitted to it in the end. Or maybe that was it. That pathetic submission. Everybody laid down and took what life gave to them, in the end, only the Soldier had the misfortune of lying down and taking it over and over.

But he needed this. It fixed whatever the hell was wrong in his brain. Chopped up neural pathways to resolve his mental issues and substitute all new, but more manageable, ones. And that got him thinking so he asked as the whirring wound down and the sparks stopped flying, "Hey, Charlie. You guys do this to fix some mental problems he's got, right?"

Charles answered without looking away, "So I'm told."

"What'd happen if you used those headphones on him? The ones you used on Chris?" Brock asked.

Charles paused in his work then before straightening and turning to look at the Soldier. The man in question was heaving breaths like he'd just run a marathon, hair damp and clinging to his sweaty face. "A very good question," Charles said in a slow sort of way that could only mean his mind was working on overdrive as he thought about it. "With his enhanced biology, I imagine the reaction could be-" He cut himself off, then looked at Brock with a gleam of excitement in his eyes. "Perhaps a test would be in order."

Suddenly Brock wasn't so sure about the idea. Something about that greedy look made him want to take back what he'd said.

Shit, what was he so afraid of? He stood there and watched the Soldier get fried like a fly in a bug zapper every couple of years, clear evidence of the efficacy of HYDRA's mantra about order coming from pain. But what if the alternative was a little more efficient? "Yeah. After we get back from the assignment, you can give it a try. I'll sign off on it." The only higher authority on matters dealing with the Soldier was Pierce. And this wasn't something that ran any kind of risk of bodily harm to the Soldier, so his input wasn't required.

Still, he couldn't help the wave of unease that came over him at the pleased look on Charles' face.

The assignment went about as well as usual. Nobody fucked anything up, and they got what they went out for. No major injuries were sustained. Chris was still riding his high but even with that fogging his brain, he did well. And of course, the Soldier was his usual self. Largely silent. Obedient. Successful.

The promise of the test was always at the back of Brock's mind, until the quinjet pulled into the hangar. Then it surged to the front, having become the most immediate concern he had. And he couldn't decide why. Charles wasn't stupid enough to do something that would irreparably damage the Soldier. So there was nothing to worry about.

"You did good," Brock told the Soldier. It was the truth and that was what Brock liked to tell people when he could, pleasant or not. The way the Soldier's eyes lit up was just a kind of bonus. Like when he told his nephew how impressive being on the fourth grade A honor roll was. "So I got a reward for you."

"Reward," the Soldier echoed carefully. He wasn't one for asking questions. Brock thought it was some aspect of his weird brain issues. He tended to just repeat whatever he wanted more information about in a soft but clearly curious tone.

"We're gonna see if we can fix your brain for good," Brock explained as they headed back to the Vault. The rest of STRIKE would split off from here to deliver their reports. Brock would take the Soldier back for health checks, maintenance on the arm, a shower, and hopefully the last session in the chair he'd ever need.

The Soldier's footsteps slowed, requiring Brock to stop and look back at him for an explanation. He said something in Russian. Something about not having to sit in the chair.

"Nope. Never again, if this works," Brock told him and maybe that was a lie. Why was he trying to give the Soldier that kind of hope? Charles' little headphones resolved a hearing issue. What made Brock think it was going to fix brain damage? When he looked at the Soldier, he knew why he said it. Because that expression of hope was foreign on his face. And wasn't that just the most pathetic thing? "We'll see what happens," Brock said, trying to temper the Soldier's excitement without extinguishing it entirely.

He led the Soldier to the armory. There he was disarmed. Brock was required to search him. Once, the Soldier brought a weapon back with him to the Vault. Whether he genuinely forgot about it or not was up in the air. But he remembered he had it just in time to stab one of the doctors in the room twenty-six times. When asked why he did it, the Soldier didn't have an answer except for a punchline to a joke only he understood: "Because Swiss cheese has holes in it." Brock had no idea what the fuck he was supposed to do with that and chalked it up to needing a session in the chair. Everyone who orbited the Soldier knew the risks involved.

No weapons were missed, so they headed in to one of the most secure rooms on any property HYDRA had a squirmy tentacle wrapped around.

The first thing to catch Brock's eye was Charles. That greedy kind of look was back, the one he'd gotten before when talking about his goals. Brock had never thought to ask what they were, specifically. Cashing out on his healing electricity seemed too crude for a guy as obsessed as he was with his work. "Good afternoon," Charles said. There was a standard wheeled tray beside him. On it were the headphones and doorbell swtich Brock had seen before. But it came with a battery this time. Not anything Brock recognized.

"Charlie," the Soldier said simply. He didn't get to call many people by a nickname, so he took advantage where he could.

"I imagine Commander Rumlow has discussed our plans with you, Soldier?" he asked. Most people ended up slipping into a condescending tone with the Soldier. When they deigned to adress him at all, at least. Most techs and doctors didn't, save for curt instructions-lift this arm, bend that knee. Brock had liked the Rev because he didn't do that at all.

"To end cognitive maintenance sessions," the Soldier responded. He couldn't keep a thread of hope from twining its way into his voice and Brock thought suddenly of Oliver Twist. Please sir, can I have some more? Only instead of soup for a starving kid it was a couple hundred volts for a diseased brain.

"Maybe," Brock reminded him. Brock never knew the specifics of what was wrong with the Soldier. He wasn't permitted that, for whatever reason, even if he thought a handler should know a thing like that. But it was something known only to his doctors and the technicians who worked the chair, and Pierce himself. He thought it was some kind of tumor or other thing that kept coming back. It'd explain why they had to fry it away over and over, whatever it was. Maybe Charlie's miracle cure could keep it gone for good.

"Let's begin," Charlie said, like they were all servants to his whims. "Take a seat."

The Soldier looked a little uncertain then. Same chair, different shock. But he did as he was told, as he nearly always did. He glanced at Brock as if to double check that this was right, got a nod, and settled.

"Now, I won't bore anyone with the details. I'm simply going to slip this on-" Charlie said, passing the headphones in front of the Soldier's face before fitting them. Some of his hair was in the way and Charlie pushed it back, making sure the headphones made contact with the Soldier's ears. "-and when I press this button, electricity will pass from the device to your brain. It won't be painful, you may lose track of time, and you may have minor convulsions or other similar side effects. These are normal, and temporary." Charlie turned away briefly, double checking the connection between the battery and the doorbell switch.

Brock furrowed his brow. "Didn't see that last time," he said.

Charlie glanced at him and he looked almost caught out, somehow. That look alone almost made Brock call off the whole thing. But then it was gone as quick as it came as Charlie said, "The Soldier's enhanced biology may require a higher voltage than a normal human being."

"And that's not going to cause more pain or damage?" Brock asked, because it sure as hell didn't sound right to him.

"I don't anticipate such an effect, no," Charlie said.

"But you can't be sure," Brock said more than asked because that much was plain.

"You've already signed off on the test." Charlie looked back at the Soldier, and that pleasant smile was plastered there again. "Here we go."

Brock tensed, very unsure about everything. This was a mistake. Had to be.

The Soldier stiffened and Brock could definitely hear something humming this time. Not like in that strip mall office. "You damage him and it's your ass," Brock said.

"I can't do any worse than what's already been done," Charlie muttered, eyes on his wristwatch.

Suddenly, there were heaving gasps as the Soldier fought for breath. The plates in his left arm clicked against each other in a downward ripple of motion. His eyes rolled back in his head and this definitely was not the way things had gone with Chris. Not at all. "Stop it," Brock barked.

"Twelve more seconds and we'll be finished here."

"Jacobs, I swear to God-"

"God has nothing to do with it, Commander." His eyes were fixed to that fucking watch and Brock seriously considered shooting that damn thing right off his wrist if it would get the other man's attention. Then the switch was flicked and the Soldier melted limply back against the chair, staring vacantly into space. Charlie snatched away the headphones and took the Soldier by the jaw, looking into his face with complete concentration.

"What the fuck did you do?" Brock snapped.

Charlie hissed and waved a hand at him, as if to shut him up. Brock laughed, incredulous with this guy's tenacity. Brock stalked towards him, ready to put him in his place when the Soldier spoke in Russian. Muttered, was more like it. "What is he saying?" Charlie demanded.

Brock furrowed his brow. "Nonsense. Something about the sky being torn." He was certain he heard that.

"Anything else?" Charlie asked of the Soldier. He hissed back at Brock, "Ask him! Order him to answer me!"

It was like an entirely different man had been substituted in the space of the blink of an eye. Brock didn't know which bizarre thing to focus on first.

And then the Soldier uttered something again.

"Well?" Charlie asked impatiently.

"He said...I don't know..." He wracked his brain for a translation that would make sense. The Soldier had never been particularly poetic before so it was always pretty straightforward shit. This was harder to understand. He tried his best. "It's like, an empty well? Empty spring...?" He snarled suddenly, irritated with himself for playing Charlie's game. "You fried his fucking brain to shit, is what it is!" He took a few steps closer, ready to haul Charlie off for knowingly harming the Soldier.

Charlie flinched back. "He's fine!" he snapped, indignantly. "See for yourself!" He gestured back to the chair where the Soldier sat up straight, staring at his hands.

"What the hell is this," Brock heard him whisper in English. His grey eyes were wide and dazed, frantic almost. They flicked up, taking in their surroundings. He drew ragged, panting breaths before his eyes landed on Brock. His brows drew together, a desperate confusion displayed there, but somehow different from the sort Brock was accustomed to. That kind of childlike naievity the Soldier had-it was gone. "Who are you? Where am I?" he demanded, finding his feet.

"It worked," Charlie all but spat. "It fixed his mind. But I don't think your superiors were so keen on it being anything but broken."

"What is this?" the Soldier demanded again, screaming this time, holding out his left arm towards them.

"Soldier, calm down," Brock told him but this was not his Soldier. All the same, he held out his own hands, palms out, in the universal gesture of pacification.

Being addressed directly seemed to calm the Soldier, a little. "Americans," he muttered, as if to himself. "Okay, okay."

"Yeah. You aren't with the Russians anymore," Brock said. He'd forgotten this more than once but somehow Brock didn't think that was what he meant when he brought up their nationality.

"Russians? What happened to me?" the Soldier asked. "Where am I? Where are the others? Did we get Zola?"

Doctor Zola, Brock knew, had been instrumental in the creation of the Winter Soldier. The first handler, basically. So why would the Soldier be out to get him? "Tell me what you remember," Brock asked instead of answering.

But this wasn't his Soldier so he didn't get a response without a fight. "Look, pal, I don't know what's going on, but it's seriously making my head spin. Every damn thing in this room looks like something out of Weird Tales and I have a fucking robotic appendage, and you aren't explaining anything, and I'm about to fucking-"

"Okay," Brock cut him off because this was all wrong, this was all so very wrong. What had Charles done? Who had he planted in the Soldier's mind? "Calm down." The Soldier made an incredulous expression, one that clearly asked who Brock thought he was to make a demand like that in a situation like this. So he looked to Charles and whispered in a low voice, "Get your colleagues. We're fixing whatever the hell you did."

"Destroying, you mean," Charles responded but did as Brock asked. Thank God for small favors.

The Soldier's bewildered eyes tracked Charles as he left the room. He looked hungrily out the door, eager for any kind of information, some vital clue that would have this all making sense for him.

"Tell me the last thing you remember clearly and then I can know where to start filling in the gaps," Brock said, bringing the Soldier's attention back to him.

He swallowed, looked away as he thought about it. "The train. W-we were going after Zola."

"We who?"

"The Commandos."

That word snagged on something in Brock's brain and now he was the one confused. "What Commandos?"

"The ones in the special fucking forces!" the Soldier all but snarled as he stood up again, hands coming up beside his head with balled fists shaking. He dropped them again quickly, like he'd forgotten one of his arms was made of metal now. He breathed heavy and shallow.

"Take deeper, slower breaths," Brock told him.

"Feel like I'm in a fucking nightmare," he muttered, ignoring Brock completely. His wild eyes darted around the room, taking in the computer monitors, the wheeled trays with their arrays of medical equipment, even swept Brock up and down like there was something wrong with him. "And what the fuck are you wearing anyway?!"

Brock gave a weird, wry smile, unable to stop himself. "Look, it's going to be okay," he told the Soldier.

And that seemed to do something for him because he breathed out, calming a little. "I just want to know what's going on. What all this is. What happened to me." He looked around the room slower now, taking in the displays on the various monitors. A couple were for tracking vitals, but they were't running right now. A third was for the inner workings of the arm. Another was for the chair. And the other few were for record keeping purposes...even if one of them had somebody's game of Minesweeper still up and running.

His fascination with the machinery combined with his insistence that he'd been out to 'get Zola' had Brock wondering, so he asked, "Can you tell me what year it is?"

"1944," he answered easily at first. But then his eyes fell briefly before he looked again at the computers. "But I'm thinking it's not anymore, is it?"

1944\. Why the hell would the Soldier think it was 19 fucking 44? Brock knew about the cryopreservation, of course he did. He was there every time the Soldier went in or out of it. But there was no way such a thing had been around since the god damned 40s. And the Soldier-he looked too damned young to have been around since then. It didn't compute.

Just then, the door opened. The Soldier looked up immediately, tense and on guard. If he thought it was the 40s, if he was in some elite unit of commandos, out to get Dr. Arnim Zola-  
"Jesus," Brock whispered as all the factors fell into place and he knew all at once who this man was. Didn't know how the hell it was possible, but he knew it couldn't be anybody else.

"Fellas," James Barnes said, becuase this was not Brock's Soldier anymore. He shifted a little uneasily, taking a step back from the guys in the coats. "You the ones I have to thank for this thing?" He shrugged his left shoulder.

"Not personally, no," one of the two doctors, Anderson, responded. "Please sit back."

"Why?" Barnes asked. He thought he was at war still. Woke up with a fucking robotic limb in some room full of futuristic technology. Why wouldn't he be combative?

"It's routine," Brock told him. "Like a check up. Then we'll get down to brass tacks once we're sure you're physically okay."

"I'm missing an arm and a couple decades at the least, pal. I'm pretty patently not o-fucking-kay," Barnes said.

The three techs-Charlie included-went to the monitors and started tapping away at the screens without comment. The overhead components of the chair twitched slightly and Barnes jerked back. "Vision test," Anderson said without missing a beat.

"Liked the paper on the wall method better," Barnes muttered, still staring at the imposing machinery.

Brock shot a glance at Anderson that went ignored. Why didn't they just tell the guy about whatever disease he had? Maybe they didn't want to cause unnecessary stress, since the chair was obviously effective-

He shifted his weight uncomfortably as it hit him. The contrast in personality between Barnes and the Soldier, the probable reason for it. Did they even check if Charlie's method fixed whatever was wrong in Barnes' brain? Why were they going right to this? If the whole reason for the chair was to cure him, wouldn't they want to know if they didn't need it anymore? Wouldn't it be better to have a soldier who didn't require so much oversight and maintenance? Who could think on his own?

He thought about Charlie's snide remark, about the higher-ups not really wanting the Soldier to be fixed. The chair had nothing to do with erasing a disease and everything to do with erasing a person.

Brock looked up at the Soldier-at Barnes-and he was reluctantly sitting back. He could see that Barnes didn't one-hundred percent buy that this was a vision test. That reluctance turned into outright defiance once the arm restraints locked into place. "Idiot, fucking idiot," Barnes muttered angrily to himself. Brock could see him testing the bonds, muscles straining against them. He kicked out, doing whatever he could with whatever was in reach of his legs, but all he managed was to kick away a rolling medical tray. "Fuck!"

The overhead pieces twisted around above him and he jerked back, wide eyes going to them immediately. Anderson approached cautiously, out of range of his legs. "Open your mouth," he instructed like he was talking to the Soldier.

Barnes spat at him. "Let me go!"  
  
"You have two options. Open your mouth," here Anderson paused to hold out the bite guard a little. Then he drew it back to reveal option number two. "Or bite off your tongue. It's easier for me if you go with this." Anderson held out the bite guard again.

"Nothing about me is going to be easy until you let me go," Barnes said.

Anderson sighed angrily before turning to Brock. "You wanna help here? I'm already being held up by all this, I really don't want to be here late sewing his fucking tongue back together."

"Makes you think he's gonna listen to me?" Brock answered without thinking. He was glad that was the first thought that escaped him without a filter.

"You're his handler. Handle him!" Anderson shoved the mouth guard into Brock's hand before returning to the bank of monitors.

"Handle me, and I'll kick your balls up into your brains," Barnes threatened. He talked big but his eyes were wide and terrified and even that expression was somehow different than the Soldier's version. The Soldier's fear was meek and childlike. Barnes' was bordering on crazed. And why not? World War II soldiers probably knew all about fates worse than death.

"Jesus," Brock muttered to himself. He was learning all the things he wasn't supposed to learn and now he knew why. He was in too deep to be this conflicted now. He took a couple steps forward and yanked Barnes' head back by the hair. His mouth fell open automatically and before he had time to clamp it closed, Brock shoved the bite guard in. He held one hand over it, the other coming down to try to keep Barnes' jaw closed. He could feel him straining to open it. "Hurry this up," he snapped back at the others.

Anderson muttered something irritably. Brock couldn't hear over Barnes' muffled attempts at shouting, over the thrashing of his head from side to side. The overhead pieces whirred and began to descend. Barnes' wide eyes shot there immediately and he redoubled his efforts, throwing his whole body into it.  
  
But it didn't matter. The pieces came down. Brock drew his hands back quick. And the chair worked its black magic. Brock forced himself to watch. He had a lot to think about.

 


	3. Chapter 3

It took three sessions, spaced a couple hours apart each, to erase Barnes out of the Soldier's head. Brock knew he was gone, because he was required to demand information from the Soldier. The first time, his addled mind still clung to bits and pieces of his apparently unwanted past-he could name three of the Howling Commandos, knew he had four sisters, had a name that started with J, lived in New York, and still retained a pitiful amount of resistance. The second time, most of these little breadcrumbs were gone, but he insisted he had a name, had a responsibility for a couple girls and some sickly boy, remembered corn fields in America. After the third session, he was clay in HYDRA's hands and Brock had no idea how to feel about any of this.

He trusted HYDRA to achieve goals that so many others couldn't because it required this exact ruthlessness. They were willing to sacrifice the needs of the few for the good of the many. That was what humanity needed if civilization was going to still even be a thing in the next few decades. Hard times demanded hard choices, not debates between a handful of heads of state lying through their teeth, not elections decided by illiterate, emotional, and uninformed populaces, not corporations buying out scientists and politicians to further their own interests. HYDRA was supposed to be the answer to this, and he still largely believed it was.

So why had they used the very same manipulative tactics Brock despised when it came to the Soldier? And was he going to tolerate it? Was this worth resigning over? Was that even an option?

There was too much he didn't know to make a decision like that. How had Barnes become the Soldier to begin with? Was he still willing? Had he ever been? If he was, why the chair? It wasn't for any brain damaging disease, Brock knew that now. The thought that they wanted an operative reduced to someone completely dependent on them for survival was outright disturbing. The Soldier may have been an efficient killer, but with the way his head was, Brock wasn't all that convinced he'd make it more than two days out on the streets alone.

And that was just how HYDRA liked it. But did he? Could he tolerate that? Did he have a choice? He had a job to do and he wasn't usually one to rock the boat. Every big outfit had its skeletons in the closet, and that was just the way things were. It was all a matter of deciding which ones you could live with knowing about. In the grand scheme of things, it came down to one guy-a guy who'd be dead by now anyway-and the direction of civilization. Brock believed in HYDRA's goal, else he wouldn't be here.

He had a little bit of time to think about that before the inevitable call for a report on what the hell had happened in the Vault. Pierce had been called in, so no pressure, right. Jacobs had been asked in separately, so the brass could dissect their reports for inconsistencies. If they found any, they wouldn't come from Brock.

Now it was just him, Pierce, and Sitwell.

Brock took his place in the hot seat. There were glasses of water available but he wouldn't take one. Didn't want to look like he was delaying anything to give himself time to conjure up a good lie. He knew Pierce well enough and wouldn't expect the man to think of him as anything but honest. Sitwell was a little more of a wild card, mostly because the pair had never really gotten along. "Thanks for meeting with us, Commander," Sitwell said, as if it were optional. When things went wrong with the Soldier because of someone else's bad decisions, there was no avoiding a Talking To.

"Of course, sir," he answered and they just dove right in because you didn't waste their time.

"So we see here that you are the one who signed off on Charles Jacobs' request for testing an electronic device on the Soldier," Pierce said, tapping the bottom of said form. "Is that your recollection?"

"Yes, sir."

"And how did Jacobs describe this test to you?"

"To be perfectly honest, sir, I'm...kind of the one who proposed it. I was just thinking out loud. About-" He paused, uncertain. "Did you hear about STRIKE agent Chris Derrin? His hearing loss?"

The two nodded. Of course they probably had. That'd been Jacobs' first strike, hadn't it? Although nobody had seen it as a big problem then.

"Well I was there for that. And I was thinking, hey, what if we use this thing on the Soldier to fix whatever's wrong with his brain? That's less time spent on maintenance, fewer technicians required for his care, just-practical things."

At that Sitwell said, a clear hint of disapproval in his voice, "So you suggested the use of experimental technology on the Soldier?"

"Yes, sir. I've read from his files that it's not the first time he's been-" He searched for a word that alluded to some autonomy, a decision from the Soldier in the matter, and found himself unable to come up with one. "That he's been used in that capacity. CT scans were developed based on procedures practiced with him, for example." Sitwell wasn't going to play this gotcha bullshit with him. Brock knew the files backwards and forwards. As much as they'd let him know, anyway, since huge chunks were obviously missing.

Sitwell didn't have a parry for Brock's jab so he continued, "And then?"

"Then Jacobs agreed to it and we tested him this afternoon. I don't know what it resolved, but it definitely changed something." It made him into a person again, he thought sickly. A person who didn't know what was happening to him, who didn't have a choice-

But who did a lot to move society into the direction it needed to go.

"Can you tell us what it is you believe necessitates the use of the electric chair?" Pierce asked him. So they were a little less interested in Charlie's test than he thought.

He shrugged without meaning to. Straightened as if to compensate for the casual gesture in such a formal setting. "My best guess was cancer. Brain tumors. Something that disrupted cognitive function. Something that came back again every time we got rid of it."

"And what do you make of the Soldier's behavior after the use of Jacobs' device?" Sitwell asked.

Why did it feel like a lot hinged on his answer to that question? Didn't matter. There was no point in sticking to anything but the truth, so he said, "I think that the use of the chair has less to do with any disease or neurological disorder than I was initially led to believe." He tried to watch their faces carefully without appearing to do so. "I think it has a lot more to do with compliance than cure."

"And if that were the case?" Pierce asked without missing a beat.

"Sir?" He needed to be completely certain that he understood what was being asked before he said something stupid.

"If it is the case that the purpose of the chair is to encourage compliance, would that change anything about your dedication to our organization and our cause?" Pierce clasped his hands together on the table as he waited for a response. One that Brock knew there was only one right answer to.

"No, sir." He fought against the urge to look down, even for the briefest second. "If the Winter Soldier truly is James Barnes, then he would be dead without HYDRA's intervention. Either from injury or age." Isn't this what he'd thought earlier? Everybody had their own sugar to coat the bitter pills with, right? "His work could be considered compensation, in its way. And when it comes to weighing one man's life against the whole of human civilization...Morally speaking, sir, the answer is self-evident."

Pierce smiled his artfully crafted politicians' smile. "Very good, Commander."

Sitwell moved along before any dwelling could occur. "The malfunctions with the Soldier have been resolved, according to the technician team currently on staff," he said. "Would you agree with their assessment?"

How the hell could he do that without being there? "I'd need a longer period of interaction to be certain, but generally I'd trust their judgement on the matter."

"The Soldier is being returned to cryostasis as we speak. He will be removed in a month for further testing to ensure no lingering issues," Sitwell told him. "You and an independent party will be scheduled to determine that." Somebody to make sure Brock wasn't leaving anything unreported to save his own ass. Handler probation. Wasn't Sitwell just happy as a pig in shit to be the one to deliver that news.

"Yes sir."

"There will be no further testing of any technology created by Charles Jacobs on HYDRA premises," Pierce told him. "Or in conjunction with HYDRA assets. He is free to do what he will on his own time, provided it does not attract unwanted attention. All further requests for testing and experimentation with the Winter Soldier are to be addressed to me until next month has proven that there have been no lasting ill effects. Is that clear?"

Fucking crystal. "Yes sir." He should have just been relieved to not be discharged from his position altogether. Even if this all could've been avoided if they'd just told him the truth from the start.

As if reading his mind, Pierce leaned forward slightly. "There are only a privileged few who know the complete truth regarding the Winter Soldier. You are now among them. It's...a complicated thing to explain to most people. So it's best if it isn't explained at all. Do you understand, Commander?"

Complicated was somehow not complicated enough. "Yes, sir."

"Good," he said, sitting back in his chair. He swept up the forms in his hand, tapped an edge against the desk once. "I think that wraps things up here." He looked to Sitwell for any further input.

"Yes," he agreed, standing up. Brock did the same. "Thank you for your time, Commander." He extended a hand. Brock did the song and dance, shake and a thanks for both of them.

He wanted a gun and a firing range.

A month without waking the Soldier meant a month Brock didn't have to see Charlie. Usually whatever interim period passed did so without note. But this time, he was relieved for that break and dreading its end. When they glimpsed each other in the halls, rare as it was, he looked like his usual friendly self. The manic greed Brock had witnessed during the experiment, as the Soldier muttered nonsense in Russian, was dormant. He wondered if anyone else here had seen it surface before.

Then the month was over and Brock couldn't be sure exactly where it'd gone. But that seemed to happen when you wanted to avoid something. He tried to remind himself the techs had done their jobs, that the Soldier would be wiped again upon release from the tank, and it'd be fine. One probationary session was nothing. It could've gone a lot worse.

That point proved itself soon enough.

The testing was going fine at first. The Soldier remembered him, and listened to him. Same with Pierce, but different in its way. Pierce treated the Soldier like a favored dog. The Soldier didn't seem to mind the condescension. Maybe he didn't have a choice in that, either.

He was put through his paces with a battery of cognitive tests. Pattern recognition, math and logic problems. He was fucking good at math, which always caught Brock by surprise somehow. The Soldier was not made for long-term thinking, because he didn't exactly have a long-term. And his personality was...different, to say the least. Those things combined with his lack of knowledge of society and its conventions could lead you into the trap of thinking he was an idiot. But he wasn't. He wouldn't be that useful if he was.

They had a conversation with him to ensure he was processing speech and able to produce it without issue. Nothing all that stimulating. It was, Brock realized midway through, propaganda. Pierce led the way, testing the Soldier's devotion to them as he did. So maybe this portion of the exam was about more than just checking on the listening and speaking skills.

Near the end of it all, as Pierce spoke with the technicians-Charlie included-the Soldier watched him go before turning to Brock and asking, "Have I done wrong?"

He knew how someone could fall into the habit of treating the Soldier like a kid. Normal people didn't worry so much that they'd 'been bad'. They didn't have to be told that, if they even cared at all. "There was an accident," Brock told him. "Wasn't your fault. We're just checking on you."

He'd always spoken to the Soldier like this before. And before he would've believed his own words. Now they felt hollow when he spoke and it moved him to anger. Anger at himself for letting this stupid situation get to him.

"I don't remember," the Soldier said. His brows furrowed as he tried. "The accident."

"That's okay." Brock watched Pierce as he spoke with the technicians. Tried to make out what was being said. A ripple of polite, work-laughter went up and he sighed. Couldn't tell what they were saying from where he was, even as he focused.   
  
But then his focus was interrupted by a noise, something like a sharp crack. He glanced behind him, where the Soldier sat on the exam table. He was staring into nothing, uttering something in Russian, but that wasn't Brock's biggest concern. No, that came when he figured out what the cracking sound was.   
  
The Soldier's first finger of his right hand hung limp, the others splayed. With his left hand, he grasped his middle finger and pulled until that same _crack_ sounded again. "Hey!" Brock barked without much thought. "That's enough!"  
  
It got everybody else's attention but not the Soldier's. He continued to whisper gibberish about the hole in the sky and the empty well behind it. He grasped the next finger in line and another sickening crack could be heard over the scuffle of feet as the techs and Pierce rushed over. "Jesus," one of the techs muttered, as if annoyed.   
  
"Soldier, desist," Brock ordered.  
  
He got nothing back but a final, awful crack as the Soldier snapped the bone of his own thumb.   
  
"Sedate him," Pierce ordered. "I want a comprehensive scan of his brain."  
  
None of the techs had the balls to complain to Pierce that sedation wasn't their job and they jumped on it. Pierce studied the Soldier's face, which was gazing into some other reality that nobody else in the room had been invited to. Pierce heard the gibberish and asked the Soldier in Russian, "Where are you, Soldier?"  
  
He just said again in Russian, "There's a hole in the sky. Empty well behind it."  
  
But Pierce had a different take on the translation than Brock. He spoke over his shoulder, as if everyone in the room existed to adhere to his orders, "Run a search on the term 'Mother of the Null.' See what it brings up and if it's linked to some kind of..." He waved a hand as he looked for the words. "Self-punishment directive."  
  
It'd happened before. Instances in which the Soldier engaged in seemingly random acts of self-mutilation. Usually it was due to stress. Thinking he was in trouble and trying to preempt the punishment by coming up with one of his own. Then there were a handful of flat-out breakdowns but those were very rare. Brock could see the argument for the former, given the way the Soldier had been asking if he'd done wrong just before it started. He just wondered what the gibberish had to do with it. He glanced over at Charlie, who must've remembered the Soldier saying it at the end of the test session before. After all, that'd been when he'd tossed off the good guy mask and shown his crazy side.   
  
But he gave no indication that he remembered at all, taking the Soldier's right arm and sinking a syringe in the crook of his elbow. "Everything's going to be just fine," he told the Soldier.   
  
"There's a hole in the sky. Mother of the Null lives behind it," the Soldier answered.   
  
Somehow that translation was even more unsettling than Brock's.   
  
The file search came up empty. Somehow Brock knew that would be the case. The Soldier was compliant throughout the examination but he was too doped up to be anything but. Each finger was splinted and he'd have to stay out of cryo for about a week to allow the damage to heal, but that wasn't so pressing. There were no assignments for him right now. Whatever they looked for in his brain checked out and the broken fingers were chalked up to stress from the testing session and too many wipes in quick succession.   
  
Brock's probation was over but the Soldier's fit meant extra work. He was required to spend a couple hours a day, in whatever arrangement he chose, with the Soldier. Which was about as boring as it fucking got because the guy was not a good conversation partner, and it wasn't like he could ask him anything about who he was before, even if it ate at him. Mostly he taught him card games he'd already taught him a dozen times before. Didn't have much to say to him until the thought occurred that he could ask and he said, "What is that shit you went on about? About the hole in the sky?"  
  
The Soldier didn't pause or even hesitate. They were supposed to be competing to finish their own game of Solitaire the quickest and he was very devoted to winning. Brock didn't mind losing because he got to go home to a bed and an apartment and real food and friends and family. He could let the Soldier win a card game. "It's where I went."  
  
"What do you mean?" Brock asked him, tossing a two of spades on top of the ace.   
  
"During the accident. I think."  
  
"So it's not a coded directive?" Brock asked him.   
  
The Soldier shook his head.   
  
"Why'd you say it all again when you broke your fingers?"   
  
"I went there again."  
  
"Giving me the creeps," Brock muttered.  
  
"Discomfort?" the Soldier asked, attention to the game totally broken. He knew nothing good came out of upsetting his handlers.   
  
"Keep playing," Brock told him. "I'm not mad. Just sounds weird. You mean like, you daydreamed this place with the hole in the sky where a lady lives or what?"  
  
The Soldier shook his head.   
  
"So where'd it come from?" Brock figured he must've gotten it from somewhere. Some book he forgot he read, a movie he forgot he saw. Maybe even a dream, if the Soldier was entitled to such things.  
  
"It's always been there. And it always will be. And we all have to go there, in the end."  
  
Brock gave up on his game entirely, watching the Soldier as he flipped through his cards. The Soldier slowed down when he felt Brock staring at him. He looked up, waited. So Brock asked, "Why'd you break your fingers?"  
  
The Soldier looked back down at his cards and shrugged. "You'd break something too, if you saw her."  
  
Brock didn't ask who. He stared at his own cards, wondering why he did this to himself. The Soldier's was a brain fucked both up and with. Nothing sensible could come out of a conversation with him. Just Hydra propaganda and nightmares treated like inevitable facts of life.

 


End file.
